The Last Of Their Kind
by Diva Urd
Summary: Centuries after the End of the Tamuli, Aphrael's words about the Trolls become true... they are becoming extinct. This story describes the end of the last of their kind. Please review!


... And here another One-Shot from Lil' Urdy! Why do I write those instead of more "Stranded" tonight, you ask? Well, for one, I felt like it, and... this will most likely be my last One-Shot in the David-Eddings-Section of ff.net for a while! The two ideas I have left right now cannot be fully developed in one chapter, and, to be frank, with one of them I don't even know whether I'll be able to write it yet.  
  
Don't worry – once I read the Eddings books again, I'll most likely return with a plethora of new ideas... but for now, I'd like to realize the story ideas I have and then turn my attention to other fandoms. I hope some of you will also want to read my stories in other sections; I appreciate each reader and, of course, each reviewer!  
  
But first, read and review THIS *g*  
  
THE LAST OF THEIR KIND  
  
Ghrelghw moved through the woods of northern Thalesia, his long arms grabbing tree trunks to pull himself forward in an oddly fluid motion. He had been looking for a she-troll for some time; the yellow thing had gone up and down many times since he had started his hunt-for-pleasure. He knew that it had become very not-simple to find the pleasure he was hunting for; there were less she-trolls, and less little trolls, every Schlee-Season that passed.  
  
Ghrelghw believed that it had something to do with the Gods shrinking. As there were less Trolls every Schlee-Seasons, there was less of the Troll Gods.  
  
Each one of the five, Khwaj, the God of Fire, Ghnomb, the God of Eat, Zoka, the God of Mate, Schlee, the God of Cold and Ghworg, the God of Kill, could not do the not-simple things anymore that made them Gods. Ghrelghw thought that soon, the trolls must kill them, as one would kill the troll cub that did not have enough strength to live. It filled him with not-happiness.  
  
But for now, he pushed the Gods from his simple thoughts. Once again he stopped and bellowed out the Howl of Mate, in hopes that a she-troll would heed his call and have little trolls from him.  
  
There was no answer.  
  
He knew that he should stop his way not-north, and return back north – soon, he would encounter the dens of the man-things, and Ghnomb had said many Schlee-Seasons ago that they were not good-to-eat anymore, and Ghworg had said that they were not good-to-kill anymore, either.  
  
Ghrelghw didn't understand why the Gods suddenly changed their minds about the man-things – before, they had been good-to-eat, and it had been fine to hunt and kill them. Maybe their thoughts were sick – that was what God- Speaker Bhlokhw had thought. Of course, the man-things had killed Bhlokhw many Schlee-Seasons ago, when he had tried to get a good-to-eat dog-things out of one of their group of dens. The man-things obviously didn't want to share with the trolls.  
  
Ghrelghw, however, was full of determination. He couldn't stop here! Soon, he would find a she-troll to mate with, if he just went a little further not-north...  
  
He stretched out his arms and began pulling himself through the forest again.  
  
After a short time, he finally heard what he had been waiting for – bellows of a she-troll, just slightly further not-north of him...  
  
Ghrelghw answered and sped up. Soon, however, he also heard noises that were less pleasant – a lot of agitated bird-noises, made by man-things, and then the sound of the fire-sticks they now all carried. The next bellow of the she-troll sounded very not-happy; the fire-stick must have hurt her.  
  
The voice in Ghrelghw's head, the voice that belonged to Zoka, told him to make the man-things go away, so that he could mate with her. The troll didn't even try to resist – he practically flew over the uneven forest floor, his large hands finding the tree trunks to pull himself along with faster and faster...  
  
***  
  
Torged had known that moving into the woods north of Heid had been a mistake. He had remembered how his mother had warned him as a child and as a young lumberjack not to venture too far north, for the trolls lived up north, and they would eat him. He had done everything he could to convince himself that her tales weren't true, but the unreasonable fear had always clung to him. And now, he knew why – his mother had been right!  
  
They had been living here since last summer – his brother had built the house for them and their wives and children, stating that, up here, there were the best trees to be cut. They would be able to send them down the nearby stream to Heid, marked with their names, and make a fortune selling prime wood to housebuilders and furniture makers.  
  
The only thing that had consoled him back then was, that since his mother's death, guns had been invented. Misfiring most of their ammunition at first, by then they had been working properly, were easy to aim and easy to reload, and could hold six charges of leaden bullets at once. If anything would attack them up in the woods, Torged and his brother would shoot it, and that would be the end of it.  
  
Or so he had thought back then.  
  
Now, confronted with the first troll of his life (he couldn't tell whether the large creature was male or female), he knew that he had been wrong. He had already emptied two rounds of ammunition into the bellowing thing when he had found it at his doorstep, trying to get a hold on their faithful watchdog, but so far the bullets had only managed to turn it berserk. Its huge arms sped forward with amazing speed, trying to crush in his skull. He had been screaming for his brother in the very beginning, but he wasn't sure whether he had heard him. For all he knew, he was on his own, with the troll charging and charging again.  
  
Just when he thought that matters couldn't get worse, a howl in the distance answered the bellows of his trollish attacker. It seemed that help for his opponent was on its way!  
  
***  
  
Finally, Ghrelghw caught sight of her. She was close to a man-thing den, a den that, for some reason, didn't stand with the other dens, as it was common. And she was bleeding. A man-thing stood in front of her, his fire- stick raised.  
  
He should have fled. But his blood sang with the Call of Mating. He would have her, and the man-things would not, could not stop him!  
  
He cried out his hunt-for-pleasure aloud, and started running at the squeaking man-thing.  
  
***  
  
Torged was in panic when the troll he had just heard from very far away appeared on top of the soft slope the house was situated on. Dear God, these things were fast! What could he do to survive this hopeless-seeming situation?  
  
He had somehow managed to reload his gun, but he already knew that it wouldn't be of much use. Nevertheless, he emptied it into the newcomer as he (or she?) charged at him.  
  
***  
  
Ghrelghws arms, legs and belly started hurting when the fire-stick stung him. He looked down on himself, startled to find deep holes in his thick, shaggy fur, life-fluid flowing freely from them. Enraged, he lifted his arms up to the sky, in prayer to Ghworg, asking him to relent from his statement of not-killing the man-things in this case.  
  
The she-troll had just fallen down on the ground. She was alive, but much- hurt. It didn't matter. Ghrelghw had to have her!  
  
***  
  
When the scream of fury erupted from the chest of his second attacker, Torged's brother had finally realized that something was going on in front of the house. He came running out to aid his brother, his gun in his hand. It was older than Torged's, only the third generation after firearms had been invented twenty years ago, but it was also a lot stronger. It could only hold two charges of ammunition at a time, and reloading took longer, but when you hit a deer in the chest with it, not much of the animal remained – thus, it didn't need more charges at once.  
  
He aimed at the great, shaggy, bearlike creatures, and two tremendous cracks of thunder resounded in the otherwise peaceful forest.  
  
Torged's brother, whose name was Melan, walked up to his shaking sibling, looking down at the carcasses of the creatures he had just killed with one head shot each.  
  
"Goodness," he uttered, "Momma was right, after all. I'll be damned if those things aren't trolls!"  
  
Little did he know, that he had just ended the lives of the last two trolls in existence, condemning the Troll Gods to eternal non-existence and shutting the pages of the history of pre-industrialized Thalesia forever. 


End file.
